Harry's Blog

Last night I heard an interesting report on BBC Radio 4 from Oklahoma. The programme wanted to get the views of folks in the "American heartland" following Barack Obama's first 100 days in office.

What it found was rather shocking stuff, but not very surprising.

Yes we have political extremists in the UK, but they are losers on the fringe of society - only disreputable chav scum vote for the BNP for example.

However mainstream US politics is very strange. People who claim to be Christians can seem to reconcile their faith in a man who taught peace, tolerance and loving one's enemies with such moronic levels of hate it beggars belief.

While right-wing America sat back and let George Bush and Dick Cheney dismantle what was left of democracy and freedom in the US with the Patriot Act and the Department of Homeland Security, otherwise respectable middle class Americans are calling for revolution to fight the "tyranny" of Obama's government.

This seems something of a turnaround for America's right-wing.

You hear talk of over powerful control from Washington, overspending on solving the credit crisis etc. But what this all boils down to is that President Obama is black.

That's it. That's the reason these white middle class Republicans are getting up in arms, talking about tyranny from Washington and the like. It's because they are hateful racist sputum polluting the human race.

On the BBC radio programme they spoke to a group of middle class Oklahoman women attending church groups. What they had to say seemed almost a parody.

One woman said she doubted Obama was a Christian or an American. Oh the irony. This evil bitch shouldn't be running a church group let alone anything else.

Another woman spoke of how there were now "blacks everywhere" following Obama's election victory. What, do you think he's set up a factory to pump them out and come and lower your property prices?

Any republican that claims that Obama's government is tyrannical is a liar and a mouthpiece for more extremist groups. They are laying the ground work for those armed groups that would seek to assassinate the President. They claim to be patriots while at the same time wanting to destroy the democratic process. Obama won the election fair and square, which is more than Bush did.

But Bush was white. And so that's okay. It's ironic that in electing a black man as president, the US has shown how racist its society still is. How there are people who can claim to follow the teachings of Jesus yet their hearts are full of hate for a man because of the colour of his skin.

I'd be interested in hearing comments from any white American who feels they can justify the current level of hate being aimed at Obama.

Meanwhile you can listen to the Radio 4 broadcast on BBC iPlayer. You'll find the report about 38 minutes in.